The Cricket Thread

[Kenny]

 

[Tony Towner]

It doesn't have to be that extreme, you can play attacking cricket, without kamikaze shots and giving your wicket away. That's the thing with Bazball it's cultish people feel they need to defend it or put stupid Boycott comparisons up. 550ish and declaring at tea on Day 2 has their players out in the field for the best part of 2 days, another 150ish runs on the board and 10 sessions to bowl them out twice, or score a quick 100 if preferred between their 2 innings.

 

[Wolftone]

It doesn't have to be that extreme, you can play attacking cricket, without kamikaze shots and giving your wicket away. That's the thing with Bazball it's cultish people feel they need to defend it or put stupid Boycott comparisons up. 550ish and declaring at tea on Day 2 has their players out in the field for the best part of 2 days, another 150ish runs on the board and 10 sessions to bowl them out twice, or score a quick 100 if preferred between their 2 innings.

Agree, you can play attacking cricket without being silly about it.
Besides which, if it goes to 5 days, the opposition will be batting last on a generally worn, poorer track.
I was wondering after the first test, what the implications were for revenue? All the refunded tickets, sales inside the ground, TV coverage/advertising etc.
The financial implications must be massive.

 

[Tony Towner]

Agree, you can play attacking cricket without being silly about it.
Besides which, if it goes to 5 days, the opposition will be batting last on a generally worn, poorer track.
I was wondering after the first test, what the implications were for revenue? All the refunded tickets, sales inside the ground, TV coverage/advertising etc.
The financial implications must be massive.

They insure themselves against that or at least the ticket revenue element of it, that's the responsibility of the county who holds the fixture, although premiums must be rocketing.

From memory the major reason Durham went practically bust was because they were paying the ECB to hold Tests in May which were either rained off or over quickly due to the conditions in Northern England at that time of year. It's the county who lose out, not the ECB, although I don't know what the TV implications are if any.

 

[Wolftone]

They insure themselves against that or at least the ticket revenue element of it, that's the responsibility of the county who holds the fixture, although premiums must be rocketing.

From memory the major reason Durham went practically bust was because they were paying the ECB to hold Tests in May which were either rained off or over quickly due to the conditions in Northern England at that time of year.

Ah, right.

 

[Wolftone]

Must affect local shops, pubs, bus services etc as well. Not that that effects the ECB obviously.
Apologies for going a bit off track here..

 

[Tony Towner]

Obviously a complete day missing because of an early finish is damaging, but a day lost to rain, but with the hope of play, or a lunchtime finish is a massive boost to the local pubs. I went to Headingley once when there was no play until 2.30 and the pubs were heaving from breakfast time until 2pm.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

They insure themselves against that or at least the ticket revenue element of it, that's the responsibility of the county who holds the fixture, although premiums must be rocketing.

From memory the major reason Durham went practically bust was because they were paying the ECB to hold Tests in May which were either rained off or over quickly due to the conditions in Northern England at that time of year. It's the county who lose out, not the ECB, although I don't know what the TV implications are if any.

Another reason was they held England players on long term deals...and they all lost their central contracts at around the same time (Collingwood, Harmison and Onions). So Durham went overnight from paying 0% of their hefty salary to 100%.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

On the approach...I will defend it overall as a) results have markedly improved, b) it's extremely watchable and c) I think it best suits the current set of players. If you want to play in a different style then you're going to have to pick a very different squad. I'm not sure we even have those players.

That's not to say it's infallible and that you can't adapt to the situation as appropriate, it's also reductive to pretend it's this or scoring at 2 an over, nothing in between. Absolutely fine to criticise our hookathon at Lord's last year or the shots that Root, Brook, Stokes and Smith played on Thursday (one or two you might let slide, all four of them throwing it away, less so).

 

[Carrotdude]

Tbf I don’t like some of the stupid batting we’ve seen at times - particularly from Stokes when he was trying to hit every ball for 6 no matter what in a lot of the early games of his captaincy. Brook is another culprit with ones like his dismissal in the last game.

We’re still consistently getting much bigger totals than we did for years before McCullum came in so I don’t get too hung up on the fact we could have got more if someone didn’t play a certain shot. The bowling is still a worry though on pitches like this.

 

[Carrotdude]

As usual, DW has summed it up much more neatly than I could.

 

[Tony Towner]

I'm not sure that's so true about the players outside of the openers and I do take the point that it'd be silly to drop those given we've cycled through so many pretty much since Strauss retired. Pope, Root and Stokes can all play at a pace of their choosing. All the reports about Smith were that he batted going through the gears at County level, which only leaves Brook as the unknown.

 

[Squeak]

Root is the one who has annoyed me the most with the manner of his dismissals over the last year. He is one player who simply needs to play properly as we all know what he can do when he does. He had great success playing in a more traditional style and I'd like him to be more of an anchor for the innings rather than trying to keep up with the big shotmakers we have.

I'm fine with Duckett taking the game to the opposition, Pope usually plays nicely and not recklessly so we have that, but often when we are 2 or 3 down early, we need the likes of Root and Brooks to rebuild. It wouldn't have been surprising to see us bowled out for 250 to 300 given how we played and only the dropped catches helped us get to 400. Bazball is fine at the right time and right circumstances but we do not need to be as reckless as we are at times.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Much better from Woakes this morning, he's looked short of a gallop before now but this is classic stuff from him. Just enough movement.

 

[leedswolf]

Yeah - bring back Boycott

He's just been discharged from hospital after successful surgery to remove a tumour from his throat.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

Second time fighting cancer I think. I wish him well.

 

[Squeak]

Excellent last wicket stand from the WIndies takes them ahead. Wouldn't surprise me to see England collapse second innings and throw the game away.

 

[leedswolf]

Second time fighting cancer I think. I wish him well.

Yes, I also wish the (convicted) woman beating racist the best of health.

 

[PuntsWolf]

Joe Root bowling some right buffet

 

[Carrotdude]

Not a great test of the whole ‘use Mark Wood’s pace to get wickets on flat pitches’ thing this